The present invention relates to a transverse control arm of a motor vehicle.
The following discussion of related art is provided to assist the reader in understanding the advantages of the invention, and is not to be construed as an admission that this related art is prior art to this invention.
Transverse control arms are used in the automotive industry to guide and steer wheels. The transverse control arm represents, on one hand, the connection with the bearing arrangement of the wheel and, on the other hand, the connection with the chassis of the vehicle. The bearing arrangement includes in addition to the wheel bearing and the driveshaft also a pivot bearing, a connection with the steering knuckle and with a guide joint, with the tie rod and additional elements for the steering system, the drive train, the suspension and the brake of the vehicle,
During operation of the vehicle, the transverse control arm is subjected to various stresses. For this reason, more than one transverse control arm is frequently provided for each wheel. The high stress on the transverse control arm can be counteracted with a particularly solid and stable structure. However, such structure is frequently very heavy, thus increasing fuel consumption.
A weight-optimized design is possible with materials having a particularly high strength or with a combination of different materials. In particular, highly stressed bearing attachment regions may be constructed from cast parts or milled components, which are connected with a base body made of sheet steel. However, this hybrid construction has the disadvantage that the individual components must be connected with one another, resulting in disadvantageously high production costs.
Particularly the durability of a transverse control arm and hence the safety of the vehicle is a very significant point which must be considered when constructing and designing a transverse control arm. Connection regions between different components of a hybrid transverse control arm must be particularly carefully designed.
It would therefore be desirable and advantageous to provide an improved transverse control arm which obviates prior art shortcomings and which has high strength and low weight, and which is easy to produce while also having high durability.